Three Myths of Social Media

There is a groundswell of well-intentioned but unfounded faith in social media as the cure-all for a lack of mission-driven design discipline.

If you believe that social media is a medium that you can use to share your mission, tell your supporter’s stories, and create a culture of communication with the organization, then just do it.

There are four key reasons why any business and brand should participate in social media: Strategic (for what purpose are we doing this?), inspirational (motivating our peers and followers), relational (building and stewarding relationships), and aspirational (as a voice of visionary and courageous leadership).

Keep these four reasons in mind as you overcome these three myths of social media:

Myth #1: We don’t have time

The real issue is not that you don’t have time. You haven’t made social media part of your social network ecosystem and a priority of your communicating your mission with clarity.

Is the real issue lack of time, or is it fear? Is it fear of making a mistake? Fear of what to do? Fear of what tools to use?

An effective social network ecosystem includes many elements, and is designed to focus attention on your organization’s mission. Remember to be less concerned about the media you're using, and more aware of the audience you're trying to reach. That’s how you get your content to align with you’re audience’s interests. The core of a social media strategy begins with:

• A web site with a blog, and embedded sharing capability (that’s where your content resides and how it can be shared).
• Twitter – with an account that belongs to your organization, not a personal account posting on behalf of the organization.
• Email communication, using an email management platform such as MailerLite. You’ll want a platform that makes it easy to create mobile and tablet-friendly email, that also display well on desktop devices. Active Campaign does this very effectively, with an elegant drag and drop interface with flexible layouts, and the benefit or automation.
• Measuring interactions between social sharing and traffic to your web site, donor pages, and other intended content destinations.

Remember, all media is social media. A social media ecosystem is an inter-related social network, beginning with your contact list, and growing in reach and influence as your content is shared across the networks.

All of these will be integrated. Integration means that your messaging, your marketing and your methods have continuity between all of the elements.

Imagine how customer engagement will improve if you understood how intentionally-designed and integrated communications impact the perception of your brand and the customer experience.

Myth #2: We don’t have a voice

Don’t be fooled. You already have a voice, the question is: Is it focused, coherent, and communicating your mission with clarity?

Your organization is not a brand. It has a purpose, an identity, values, and a culture. It represents a specific cause and must be a voice of visionary and courageous leadership on behalf of the cause.

Stop thinking like a brand, and think like a human. Humanize your organization. People don’t connect with brands, they connect with shared values, emotion, and meaningful experiences.

Begin strategically, with a managed, focused voice that speaks on behalf of your organization and the causes it represents.

Keep in mind: it’s not just about your organization. It’s about your audience—the customers, ambassadors, donors, advocates, champions, and community you’re seeking to attract, inspire, inform and engage. Putting them first makes them part of your narrative, and not simply an observer of it.

Be Inspirational

Social media can be a place for inspiring your followers if you are intentional.

Think of how you will use social media as a means to raise your voice, and speak on behalf of the values and beliefs that your brand champions. Your organizational voice is based on your organization’s purpose, character, and cultural attributes of who you are, what you value, and why you matter.

Your voice will build trust and credibility. Your roles may include acting as an:

• Influencer: Sharing content that advances your cause and how others think about it. To direct followers to content and motivate them to action. This strategy requires that you have a content-rich web site, or reliable and credible content sources to drive traffic to.
• Convener: For posting events, sharing news and information, and sharing other organizations’ content.
• Champion: Highlight how your brand impacts the lives of customers, supporters, followers, and advocates through stories and successes. Tell their stories with your voice!  We really admire how My Lasting Legacy helps community foundations share donor stories to help the foundations raise more money.